Expecting miracle for health and prosperity at Lourdes
Kornelius Purba, The Jakarta Post, Lourdes, France
Air France recently invited a group of Indonesian journalists, including The Jakarta Post's Kornelius Purba, to tour the airline's facilities at the Paris-Charles de Gaulle airport, and to visit Lourdes. The following is his report on Lourdes.
What would you do if all the doctors you visited said you would have to spend the rest of your life in a wheelchair, or if they told you they had given up trying to cure the ailment that is killing you slowly? You might visit sacred places and wait for a miracle recovery, or try alternative medicines.
Many people believe that visiting sacred places is good not just for sick people, but also for healthy people seeking peace of mind and prosperity.
Many Catholics may expect to experience a stroke of luck by visiting a small town in southern France and praying in a grotto where the Virgin Mary reportedly appeared 144 years ago.
May and October is the most popular time to visit Lourdes and the grotto, and the city is often overcrowded during these months. This is because the Catholic church pays special honor to the Virgin Mary at this time, and the months are often called the Months of Rosary.
A small town of 15,000 people, Lourdes receives about five million tourists per year and is the third largest tourist destination in France after Paris and Nice.
The proportion between the local population and visitors is amazing by Indonesia's standards. With a population of 203 million, Indonesia received the same number of tourists as Lourdes did last year.
The city is situated about 1,200 feet above sea level, in the foothills of the Pyrenees in the southern part of France. It has been a major destination for pilgrims since 1858, since the Virgin Mary appeared on Feb. 11 to 14-year-old Bernadette Soubirous in a small grotto. The grotto is just about 50 meters from the banks of the Gave River.
Bernadette was the eldest of three children of Francois Soubirous and his wife Louise Casterot.
The Virgin Mary appeared 18 times between Feb. 11 and July 16, 1858, including her 16th appearance on March 25, when the Virgin Mary announced herself as the Immaculate Conception.
On Feb. 25, the Virgin Mary asked Bernadette to dig a hole near the grotto where she would find a spring. The young girl was asked to go drink and wash her face there.
The spring currently produces about 122,400 liters of water a day. Pilgrims, especially the sick, follow the tradition of bathing there with the assistance of volunteers.
According to an official publication, when her asthma became worse, Bernadette was taken to the hospice in Lourdes. Six years later she left the shelter and entered the congregation of the Sisters of Nevers as a novice. She died at the age of 35 in 1879.
Next to the grotto where Bernadette spoke with the Virgin Mary, three basilica where built. On the rock of the grotto lies the Upper Basilica, the Crypt and the Rosary Basilica.
Since 1858, the Catholic church has recognized 66 instances of miraculous cures at the spring. On March 1, 1858, during the 12th vision of the Virgin Mary, the first miraculous cure took place, involving Latapie Chouat Catherine, 38. Seven miracles occurred during Mary's 18 appearances.
The latest recognized miraculous cure at the spring involved Jean Pierre Bely, who was 51 years old when he visited Lourdes in September 1987 and suffering from prolonged multiple sclerosis. He was able to walk after 15 years in a wheelchair.
Church authorities, however, granted an official ecclesiastical approval to Bely's cure in 1999, or 12 years after the event, after a panel of doctors and bishops could not find a medical explanation for the recovery. In 2000, 30 cases of surprising recoveries were reported to the church and 33 last year.
Citing the French magazine Le Nouvel Observateur, Guardian News Service reported that in the 1990s, when the Roman Catholic Church was reluctant to recognize miracles, the number of visitors to Lourdes dropped.
The grotto is open throughout the year, though most tourists visit from March to October. If pilgrims want more privacy they can visit during the winter, because a relatively small number of pilgrims choose that period to pray in the grotto.
How to get to Lourdes? From Jakarta, Air France has direct flights to Paris. The airline also provides connecting flights, about a one-hour flight, to Pau. Pau is about 50 kilometers from Lourdes. The airline staff is very helpful in serving sick or disabled passengers. You can also travel to Lourdes from Paris by train, with a direct connection between the two cities.
There are about 600 hotels in the city to accommodate visitors. Lourdes is relatively safe, although pickpockets have been known to work in the area around the grotto.
More information is available at www.lourdes-france.com.